The Symbol of the Cross

Religions become associated with the symbol that represents what they believe. Buddhism is associated with the lotus flower. Judaism, the star of David. The crescent symbolizes Islam. The early church used the symbol of a fish (fish = “ichthys”), an acronym for “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior” (“Iesus Christos, Theou Huios Soter”).

For the last 2,000 years, the cross has come to be the universal symbol for the Christian church. Other symbols could have been chosen – a manger, stone, throne, or a dove.  In some ways, it is an odd choice. The cross is a reminder of Jesus’ crucifixion. Crucifixion, though not invented by the Romans, was perfected under their rule to become the cruelest method of execution ever practiced, deliberately delaying death until maximum torture. Additionally, to the Jew, crucifixion was a method of death cursed by God (Deut. 21:23).

The fact that a cross became the Christian symbol, and that Christians stubbornly refused, in spite of the ridicule, to discard it in favor of something less offensive, can only have one explanation. They believed the centrality of the cross originated in the mind of Jesus himself.

Jesus

Nearly one-third of each of the Gospel’s account of Jesus’ life is spent on the last week of His life, His death, and Resurrection. Mark’s gospel records that Jesus, on three separate occasions, warns his disciples in advance that he is headed to Jerusalem to suffer and die (Mk. 8:31-32; 9:31; 10;32-34). The gospels records at least eight more occasions where Jesus alluded to his death. The Gospel of John records seven references to Jesus’ “hour”, and Jesus states in the garden: "Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? 'Father, save me from this hour'? But for this purpose I have come to this hour.  Father, glorify your name” (John 12:27-28). It is clear in the Gospels that Jesus knew he would die – because of the hostility of the Jewish religious leaders and the Old Testament prophesies. What is most clear is that Jesus was going to the cross willingly. What dominated the mind of Jesus was not the living but the giving of His life.

The Apostles

Paul Defined his gospel as the “message of the cross”; his ministry as “we preach Christ crucified”. When contrasting the gospel to worldly wisdom, Paul wanted to know nothing “except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul says that what is of “first importance” is “that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day” (1 Cor 15:3-4). Paul will go on to say that He boasts in “nothing but the cross” (Gal. 6:14)

Peter begins his first letter by telling believers they have been sprinkled with the blood of Jesus Christ. Peter explains that Jesus died as our substitute; “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed”, and “For Christ also suffered  once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God” (2:24;3:18). John, in his Revelation, introduces Jesus as “him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood” (1:5). Twenty-eight time John refers to Christ as the “Lamb”, signifying that he was slain as a sacrifice and by His blood he has set sinners free.

The cross stands as the symbol of our faith. The significance is not the symbol, but what it symbolizes: the central work of Jesus was dying for us and suffering the wrath of God in our place. As Chris Tomlin wrote:

Mighty, awesome, wonderful

Is the holy cross

Where the Lamb laid down His life

To lift us from the fall

Mighty is the power of the Cross.